charbon

Definitions

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

n. A small black spot or mark remaining in the cavity of the corner tooth of a horse after the large spot or mark has become obliterated.

n. A very contagious and fatal disease of sheep, horses, and cattle.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English

n. A small black spot or mark remaining in the cavity of the corner tooth of a horse after the large spot or mark has become obliterated.

n. A very contagious and fatal disease of sheep, horses, and cattle. See Maligmant pustule.

from The Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

n. A little black spot or mark remaining after the large spot in the cavity of the corner-tooth of a horse is gone.

n. In pathology, anthrax; malignant pustule. See anthrax.

n. In botany, a name formerly applied to the smut of wheat; also, sometimes applied to the black rot of the grape, especially in France.

Etymologies

French (Wiktionary)

Examples

Malignant pustule is a furuncle - or carbuncle-like lesion resulting from inoculation of the virus generated in animals suffering from splenic fever, or "charbon," and is accompanied by constitutional symptoms of more or less gravity.

It was Koch who in 1876 described with great clarity the life cycle of the bacterium Bacillus anthracis and completed the proof that it causes the disease that is known in German as Milzbrand (fiery spleen), in French as charbon (because of the blackened scab it makes on the skin), in Russian as Siberskaya yasva (Siberian ulcer), and in English as anthrax (from the Greek for coal).

The parasitic nature of charbon was therefore absolutely demonstrated, first, by the constant presence of _Bacillus anthracis_ in the blood of anthracoid animals, and second, by the pure culture of the parasite and the inoculation of animals with charbon by means of it.

Davaine's bacterium by cultivating it in a decoction of beer yeast that had been previously sterilized (Fig. 2); and after from ten to twenty cultures, he found that a portion of the liquid containing a few bacteria, when used for inoculating a rabbit, quickly caused the latter to die of charbon, while the same liquid, when filtered through plaster or porcelain, became harmless.